As new vehicles are manufactured, they use the latest electronic vehicle bus communication protocols, such as SAE J1939, as standards for communication among on-board electronic component control modules. This creates a problem for integration of older devices or equipment onto these newer vehicles. Typically, older devices have the ability to communicate only on lower level vehicle bus communication protocols, such as SAE J1708 or SAE J1587, or do not have the ability to communicate on a vehicle bus protocol at all.
While there are other communication devices available to translate among different vehicle bus protocols, they are only modular devices with very limited capabilities that are primarily used for periodic on-board vehicle device status monitoring or vehicle diagnostic purposes only. Not only do they not have the capability to permanently integrate a device into a vehicle bus system, they also do not have any ability to allow for integration of analog signal controlled equipment into a vehicle bus network.
Thus there is a need for a system which has the capabilities and reliability required for permanent integration of an incompatible device into a vehicle bus network. Such a system would allow for the installation of incompatible equipment onto vehicles which was previously not possible.
Numerous innovations for communication devices and methods for communication among different electronic vehicle bus communication protocols have been provided as described below. Even though these innovations may be suitable for the specific purposes to which they address, however, they differ significantly from the present invention.
U.S. Pub. No. 2005/0002417, to Kelly et al., teaches methods and systems for performing protocol conversions in an environment including a work machine having one or more modules coupled to one or more data links. Such methods and systems may leverage one or more gateways to perform tunneling, translating, and bridging operations. Tunneling processes may include receiving a message from a source module in a first protocol, encapsulating the message within transmission units of a second protocol, and transmitting the encapsulated message via the second protocol. Translating processes may include receiving, by the gateway, a message in a first data link protocol including a parameter identifier. The gateway may then provide the scaled parameter data to a module using the second data link protocol, however the present invention does not encapsulate the messages, it translates them using conversion tables and scaling based on the message identifiers as well as Kelly et al. does not teach several other advantages and improvement of the present invention.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,984,225 to McClure et al., teaches methods and systems for providing data communications between a motor vehicle electronic control module network and an RS-232 serial ASCII-text capable device using one or more of a plurality of different protocols. It primarily describes the translation and overall communication among various vehicle control modules and an external device. The present invention is, however, designed to be permanently mounted to the vehicle and McClure et al. does not teach several other advantages and improvement of the present invention.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,684,904 to Wainwright et al., teaches a system and method for facilitating substantially seamless interface among individual component systems for sensor fusion, data exchange, and communication across a broad spectrum of component systems in a vehicle without implicating hardware or software upgrades within individual legacy systems and/or sensors. A universal translator is provided to interface among individual system components that exchange data in a seamless manner among legacy data formats and specific data formats advantageously employed by newly-developed, procured and installed individual component systems.
It is apparent now that numerous innovations for communication among vehicle components have been provided in the prior art that are adequate for various purposes. Furthermore, even though these innovations may be suitable for the specific purposes to which they address, accordingly, they would not be suitable for the purposes of the present invention as heretofore described. Thus a device and method for communication among vehicle components operating on different electronic vehicle bus communication protocols so as to permanently integrate an incompatible vehicle component into the vehicle option is needed.